breathe breathe
by Neon Genesis
Summary: This is a witch hunt. There's no room for your love story. Sasuke x Sakura. Alternate Universe. On Hiatus.
1. hello, hello

Author's Note: Pretty excited for this story, not gonna lie.

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**breathe breathe**

Uchiha Sasuke moved to town a week before Sakura's sixteenth birthday.

She began hearing all about him the moment he stepped through the door of Konoha High School—_about six feet tall, _the other girls told her in hushed, giggly voices, _with dark hair and eyes, looks too old to be a sophomore, but damn, aren't we lucky?_—but did not actually see him until the five minutes between third and fourth block.

And that was it. She'd never encountered one before, but she could _tell_. He was one of them.

He was one of them, and he was here for her.

Lifting her chin, she walked toward him, not slipping through or skirting around the other students as she normally did, but making them part for her. Not that she noticed—she was watching him, only him, and he her. She went right up to him, said softly, "I know what you are."

Faintly, faintly, he smirked. "Could say the same to you."

Being that close to him, to one of _them_, make her feel a little fear, and a little thrill. Sakura liked it. She went on, "And I'm not afraid of you." Tossing her hair, she added, "Just so you know."

"Well." He lifted a brow. "That's a relief."

She swallowed. Her heart beat fast in her chest, _bum-bum-be-dum, bum-bum-be-dum-dum_. She asked, "How old are you?"

He considered her for a moment. "Older than you."

The bell rang. By this point, the halls had emptied of all the other kids; they were alone, she and Sasuke. In a week's time, this would be the worst situation imaginable.

As it was, she rocked back on her heels, peering up at him through too-long bangs. "My name is Haruno Sakura," she said lightly, "but you know that. My birthday is March twenty-eighth, and you know that as well." She tilted her head. "How long have you been counting down the days?"

He placed his hands in his pockets. His gaze was heavy on her, and his tone cool when he noted, "You _are _afraid." His eyebrows drew together. "But not as much as you should be."

She smiled. It was a slow, wicked smile, and it lent a wild light to her eyes. "Do you want to know why?"

Sasuke shrugged, moving to pass her. "Don't really care. It doesn't make a difference either way." Turning partway toward her, he said calmly, over his shoulder, "I'll kill you all the same."

"You'll hunt me," she corrected, still smiling even as her heart crashed-crashed-crashed against her rib-cage like waves against the shore, "but you won't kill me. I'm ready for you, Uchiha Sasuke. I've been ready for a long time."

He was clearly unimpressed. "Then I hope you'll at least put up something of a fight. I've killed witches before, Sakura. It's not hard."

Quietly, she said, "Then I hope you're prepared for a change of pace."

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Do you love witches, yeah I love witches, do you love witch hunts, yeah I love witch hunts...

Disclaimer: I do not own _Naruto_.


	2. ready or not

Author's Note: You guys are awesome.

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**breathe breathe**

_Day One._

"He showed up at school today," Sakura began, inspecting the clump of white rice tweezed between her chopsticks. Despite her casual manner, she had little appetite. "The witch hunter."

Her mother went still. "Is that so."

"Yeah." Sakura let the rice fall back into the bowl, before selecting a different clump. "Calls himself Uchiha Sasuke. Dunno if it's his real name, but—"

Glass shattered. Her mother had dropped the dish she'd been washing. "Uchiha Sasuke? _Uchiha_, you're sure?"

The shards of glass carpeted the kitchen floor, turned it into a glittering minefield. Slowly, Sakura looked back up to meet the green eyes that matched her own. "Yes, I'm sure. Why? What does that mean to you?" Her mother just shook her head, lips pressed tightly together, and Sakura frowned.

"Well," she said pointedly, "it's not a big deal, anyway. He's not. I can take him, Mama, I know I can. I can feel it. I can _win _this. He's just a boy, hardly older than I am, and I—"

Her mother's hand cracked across her face. "Don't you _dare_," she said softly, "treat this as a game. Do you understand me?" Her voice was steel.

Sakura stared at her. Her mother had never struck her before. Never. "I… Mama, I don't…"

"This is not something to be won—this is something you try to _survive_. That Uchiha is a hunter. Not a boy. He is a hunter, and he will cut out your heart, Sakura. He will cut it right out of your chest. Do you want your heart's last beat to be felt by the man who killed you, as he holds it in the palm of his hand?"_  
_

She did not.

_Day Two.  
_

"You've located the witch?"

Across the courtyard, Sasuke studied the creature in question. She stood with a group of friends. They were laughing. She wasn't. "About five-five, slender, shoulder-length pink hair, green eyes," he reported flatly, holding the phone some distance from his ear. "Goes by Fukuda Sakura. It's her. She's admitted it, anyway."

Silence. And then: "You know your orders, Captain."

Sasuke ended the call without replying.

_Day Three._

"Could you stop watching me all the time?" Sakura demanded. "Wanting to murder me is one thing, but stalking? Uncalled for." She and Sasuke were the only ones in the student parking lot.

"You have skewed priorities, Sakura."

"And you had better watch out, Uchiha Sasuke." She pulled down the collar of her shirt, exposing the top of her left breast. Pointing to her heart, she raised her eyebrows. "You want this? You're going to have to fight for it."

His gaze was a slow-burn as it seared its way up to her face. He smirked. "Was planning to."

_Day Four._

Sakura sat on her bed, knees drawn to her chest, and watched her mother pack her suitcase. "I'm not going to run, Mama. I mean it. I'm going to defend myself. I'm going to fight him."

"For God's sake, child, _stop_ that kind of talk." Her mother folded a bedsheet with a _snap_. "You don't stand a chance."

"But I _will_, once I get my powers," the fifteen-year-old shot back. "You said it yourself, I'll be special—_strong_—"

"I told you that so you would know. So you'd be _prepared_." Her mother rounded on her, green eyes stark against her careworn face. "He will come for you. The moment you've Changed, he will come for you, and you won't be ready to fight."

"I'm ready _now_—"

"No you are not, and you won't be then. You won't be in control of yourself, and he has been trained to take you down. An active witch hunter is _elite_. He is a professional killer."

Sakura thought, _He's just a boy. _She said, "Well, I'll have the power, and you'll have the experience. You can tell me what to do. _You _survived the hunt, you can help me fend him—"

"I survived because I fled. I ran and I ran and I _ran_, do you realize that?" Her mother looked down at her calloused hands. "I ran for seven years, until my heart was no longer any use to them. I ran so that I could have you, and you could run from them, too."

"Then what's the point?" Sakura asked dully. "What's the point if I have to spend my life running? Seven years of true magic, and I won't even get to _enjoy _them. Why even bother?"

Her mother came and sat beside her on the bed, smoothing her hair away from her face. "You're too young to have an existential crisis," she murmured, "and you are too young to die, child."

_Day Five._

"How many?"

Sasuke looked up from his book. "What?"

Sakura crossed her arms over her chest. On her nails was chipped pink polish. "How many witches have you killed?"

He considered her for a long moment. "You'll be my ninth kill." It was strange, though—she didn't look like a kill. Just… a girl.

"That's what _you _think." She stuck her chin out. It almost made him smile. "I'll be the one to get away." She tilted her head. "I may even be the one to kill _you_. Ever think of that?"

"You," he began, and did not know how to go on, so he left it at that.

She frowned. Then, she sat down beside him. "I could start running now, you know. Catch a plane to Rome or Seoul or Moscow. You'd never catch me."

"I wouldn't chase you. You know that, Sakura. You're not stupid." If she didn't Change in her own home, her heart would not come into its power. She wouldn't become a true witch.

"Of course I'm not. And I'm not going to run." She tugged her sleeves down over her knuckles. "… How long did it take you? To kill those other witches. On what day did you cut out their hearts?"

"The night they Changed." He spared her a bored glance. She wasn't stupid, yet she knew so little. So precious little.

"_All _of them? You caught them all that soon?"

"The sooner it's cut out, the more powerful the heart is." He stood, and placed his hands in his pockets. She stared up at him through that pink hair of hers. He said lowly, "Take good care of your heart, Sakura. Soon it'll be mine."

_Day Six._

"Uchiha Sasuke." She stuck out her hand. "I'd like to wish you luck."

"Would you." He eyed her hand. When she flexed it insistently, he took it. Her grip was strong. "Good luck running."

"I won't run." She wore a black dress, and black boots laced up nearly to her knees. The color was too harsh for her. It made her look older. It made her look more vulnerable. "My mother wants me to run, but I won't. I'm not like her. I love her, but I won't live like her."

"Your mother," he said. His eyebrows drew together. "She survived the hunt, then."

"Yeah. And so will I."

"Why?" he asked quietly. "Why are you so confident?" So brave. No one else had shown this courage.

She smiled. It made him want to draw a knife. "I can feel it," she told him, her hands hovering over her chest. "Feel the power. It's," she fumbled, "it's dark, and bright, and beautiful, and—it wants me to kill you." Her eyes danced. "It wants your blood to run. _I _want your blood to run."

She tilted her head. "Do _you _want to kill _me_, Uchiha Sasuke?"

He walked away.

_Day Seven._

Sakura screamed.

She screamed and writhed and tore at her hair, clutched at her stomach, clawed at her chest. It hurt it hurt oh God it hurt somebody help she was dying she was _burning _it burned somebody help she couldn't breathe oh God oh God something had gone wrong she was dying help help she couldn't breathe _she couldn't—_

Breathe.

She breathed. She felt the oxygen flood her lungs, felt her blood flow and her veins sing and her heart beat, beat, beat, she could _feel _it, feel the power, it was ready, it was _there_, at her disposal. Finally. _Finally._

She was sixteen. She had power.

And Uchiha Sasuke was at her door.

* * *

Knock knock. _Who's there? _A witch hunter. _A witch hunter who? _... Who knows, Sasuke doesn't have a sense of humor.

Disclaimer: I do not own _Naruto_.


	3. are you laughing now?

Author's Note: Oh hey guys.

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**breathe breathe**

Sakura was laughing when Sasuke kicked the door down.**  
**

She sat there in the middle of her living room floor, laughing the high bright laughter of a child and staring at her hands as if she'd never seen them before. "Hi," she said, slowing looking up at him. "Do you want to see something cool?" She reached toward him.

Green flames roared into being right where he was standing, only he wasn't there anymore. Oh well. She stood up gingerly, still physically weak from the Change. She hadn't meant to create fire in particular, only destruction. Only chaos. But she liked the look of it, the color, the way it was spreading, consuming the room—

There was a blur of movement to her left, and she turned just in time for Sasuke's blade to slice through her shoulder instead of across her throat. It didn't go deep—he hadn't meant it to be a killing blow, for her heart had to be cut out while she was still alive—but it _hurt_.

She wanted to scream. Instead she smiled.

Sasuke stood facing her, a strange gleaming knife in his hand. He was just watching her, flipping the blade casually, turning it over his fingers.

She spread her arms wide. "Well, Uchiha Sasuke? Was that it?" Drops of her blood fell to the floor, created constellations. "Won't you attack me again?" Her voice rose. "You're a witch hunter, aren't you? _Hunt _me."

He only watched her.

"Fine," she snapped, but it was hard to stay angry, for the power was rising up in her again, dark and deep, sweet as honey. She smiled again, let her arms fall to her sides. "I know something you don't know," she sang, and at that moment the green flames raced toward him, faster than before, too fast for him to dodge.

So he darted through them, knocked her to the floor.

The fire raged around them as she kicked and screamed, but it did not touch them. Sasuke was on top of her, his weight keeping her down as he crushed her throat with his forearm. His knife was in his other hand.

Sakura couldn't control the flames, couldn't direct her power. The windows broke and the sink flooded and the refrigerator melted, but she could not do anything to help herself, could only use the last of her breath to bite out, "_Let. Go. Of. Me._"

"Sakura," he said simply, his eyes dark dark dark as his knife pierced the skin above her heart, "you had to have seen this coming."

And then he'd been thrown off her. Gasping and sputtering, Sakura scrambled to her feet and backed away from him, pressed herself up against the wall, staring. Sasuke had been wrapped in a red fog, and was yelling as if it burned, scratching at his eyes as if it was blinding him.

"Mama," she whispered.

There, standing in the doorway, her legs blackened and blistered by the green flames, was her mother, her hands pressed to her temples and her face white as a ghost as she used all her magic to keep Sasuke incapacitated.

From ages sixteen to twenty-three, a witch's power was strongest. Once those seven years had passed, his or her power decreased dramatically, and continued to do so for the rest of the witch's lifespan. Sakura's mother had precious little magic; a feat such as this literally had to be killing her.

"_Mama!_" Sakura screamed. "Mama, stop it, stop, you can't—"

Her mother mouthed a single word. _Run._

But it was too late for that. If they took Sasuke down now, together, that would be the end of it. Maybe her mother would even live. Sakura took a deep breath, and called all the flames to herself, gathering them in her arms tenderly, the way a mother would a child, before hurling them at Sasuke._  
_

He screamed the jagged broken scream of an animal, and for a moment their eyes met, each of them furious, each of them determined to kill the other.

And then—

And then he was free.

He was free and completely unharmed, just standing there in the middle of her living room. The red fog was gone, as were the green flames. In one hand he had his knife; in the other, a roundish crystallized thing, gleaming darkly, glowing a deep blue.

Sakura vomited. That was a heart. That was _somebody's heart_, and he'd stolen its power, was harnessing it for his own purposes. The horror of it, the wrongness, oh God oh God that could be _her _heart, made her vomit again, splattering the floor, her feet.

He took advantage of her weakness.

Within a fraction of a moment he had her on the floor again, his forearm driving into her throat, affording her no breath to speak. She could barely maintain consciousness, so little oxygen was she getting. Hazily, she realized that her mother had collapsed, unconscious herself. Or perhaps her heart had given out on her. Perhaps she was dead.

"Who else is there to save you, Sakura?" Sasuke wanted to know. She'd goaded him into this foul temper, and now his blade dug into the same place he'd stabbed her before. She hadn't even the strength to wriggle like a beetle pinned to a card.

"Are you laughing now?" he whispered. "Are you brave now?"

Beneath even his anger, he sounded genuinely curious.

But she could not respond, could not move or draw on her magic or beg him to let her go please let her go oh God she'd do anything she just had to live she was scared to die oh please oh please oh God.

As the knife drove deeper, her last thought was this:

_I need to get away._

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THE END. Except not really. Really only the beginning.

Sorry this chapter was lateish. Kind of having a lot of things going on. A word to the wise: don't go into the service industry if you don't enjoy getting hit on by creepy old men. Unless you need money. Unfortunately, I need money.

**6/30/12 Edit**: So this guy I kind of had this thing with kind of cheated on me. Except he didn't because we didn't _really _have a thing except we did and I HATE HIM except I don't because I don't give a damn about him AT ALL but I still don't know when I'll have the heart to update. So yeah. Just a heads up.

Disclaimer: I do not own _Naruto_.


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